Pax Gaea Human Rights World Post

• Independent Serbia would bring prosperous, secure region, PM argues
• Voice of Armenian minority, newspaper editor slain in Turkey, police arrest suspect
• UK poll of young people reveals widespread ignorance of The Holocaust
  Chinese test of "Star Wars" satellite killer sparks fear in Asia, worldwide concern
• '24' faces criticism from Muslim human rights groups for 'terrorist' portrayal
• Human rights systematically ignored by business, South African Forum details
• Incriminating evidence of police violence in Genoa 2001 G8 riot "disappears"
• Demonstrations against Guinea's President Conte result in deaths by security police
• European court rules Russia did torture Chechens
• Devotees of Zeus appeal for access to 1,800 year old temple

Kosovo's moment

Agim Ceku, Prime Minister of Kosovo

PRISTINA, Kosovo: This is a critical time for the Balkans: Serbia holds parliamentary elections on Sunday as Kosovo anxiously awaits a final report on the future status of the disputed province by the UN special envoy, Martti Ahtisaari. We expect Ahtisaari to deny Serbia's demand to grant Kosovo broad autonomy within Serbian borders, and to endorse its bid for independence. We need an independent Kosovo and a democratic Serbia. The European Union, now under German stewardship, can help by ensuring a common EU position in support of independence. An independent Kosovo would benefit the region economically, politically and in terms of security. A decision on its status is long overdue, and as a result local frustrations are on the rise while the region continues to stagnate. We need a new dynamic if we are to catch up with the EU. An independent Kosovo can provide that dynamic. Only the people of Kosovo — ethnic Albanians, Serbs and other minorities working together — can ensure that the province undergoes a successful transition.A stable and prosperous Kosovo means a stable and prosperous region. Kosovo has a sound macroeconomic system, a broad tax base and a modern legislative system that protects private property and investors. Our labor laws are flexible. Kosovo has one of the simplest mechanisms for registering a company in the region. The government is currently overseeing a $2.3 billion coal energy development project — Kosovo has the fifth largest reserves of coal in the world. International Herald Tribune (1/20)

Armenian Editor Is Slain in Turkey

By SEBNEM ARSU

ISTANBUL, Jan. 19 —A prominent newspaper editor, columnist and voice for Turkey’s ethnic Armenians who was prosecuted for challenging the official Turkish version of the 1915 Armenian genocide, was shot dead as he left his office on a busy street in central Istanbul on Friday. Television images showed the editor, Hrant Dink, lying on the crowded sidewalk covered with a white sheet outside the office of his bilingual Turkish-Armenian weekly, Agos. Officials said they detained three suspects. Investigators were monitoring surveillance tapes from nearby shops. Mr. Dink, 53, a Turk of Armenian descent, often provoked widespread anger in Turkey for his comments on the genocide — which Turkey denies, saying the deaths of hundreds of thousands of Armenians resulted from hunger and other suffering in World War I. He also angered some ethnic Armenians for opposing their demand that Turkey recognize the genocide as a condition of entry to the European Union. He viewed entry into the Union as the clearest route to strengthening democracy in Turkey. In recent articles, Mr. Dink (pronounced deenk) described increasing death threats against him. “I do not know how real these threats are,” he wrote, “but what’s really unbearable is the psychological torture that I’m living in, like a pigeon, turning my head up and down, left and right, my head quickly rotating.” Reaction to the daylight shooting, both here and abroad, was swift and deep. Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan condemned the shooting as a direct attack on Turkey’s peace and stability. “A bullet was fired at freedom of thought and democratic life in Turkey,” he said in a nationally broadcast news conference. “Once again, dark hands have chosen our country and spilled blood in Istanbul to achieve their dark goals.” New York Times (1/20) UPDATE: ISTANBUL (AFP) Turkish police claimed to have identified the man suspected of killing prominent ethnic Armenian journalist Hrant Dink, a report said, as the government came under fire for failing to protect him.The police released images of the suspect, reportedly caught on the security camera of a bank in the street where the 53-year-old Dink was shot dead Friday, showing a lean, young man clad in a denim jacket and jeans and wearing a white beret. The authorities identified him as Ogun S. from the northern city of Trabzon, Anatolia news agency reported, while other media added that it was his father who called the police to say the person seen in the footage was his son. His father and a close friend were detained and expected to be taken to Istanbul for questioning, the CNN Turk news channel said. In the pictures, repeatedly shown on television channels, the man was seen holding an object, which officials said was a gun, under his jacket. Agence France Presse (1/20)

UK poll reveals striking ignorance of Holocaust

LONDON - More than a quarter of young Britons do not know if the Holocaust happened, according to a poll that has sparked alarm among Jewish leaders determined the world should not forget the Nazi genocide. "This poll reinforces the necessity to observe the motto - Never Again", said Winston Pickett, spokesman for the umbrella group, the Board of Deputies of British Jews. The poll, conducted by The Jewish Chronicle to mark Holocaust Memorial Day, showed that 28 per cent of 18 to 29-year-olds in Britain do not know if the Holocaust happened. But teachers were given some comfort by the poll - just one per cent of those surveyed by YouGov pollsters thought the Holocaust was a myth. By a majority of four-to-one they favored Britain's decision to mark Holocaust Memorial Day every year on January 27, the day in 1945 when the advancing Russian army reached the Auschwitz concentration camp. But only 16 per cent of those polled felt that denying the Holocaust should be made a criminal offence in Britain. They won backing from 85-year-old Auschwitz survivor Freddie Knoller who said: "We are in a country that has freedom of speech and I wouldn't like that to change." New Zealand Herald (12/20)

PRC space missile test sparks concern

STAR WARS?: News that China had tested a missile and shot down an aging weather satellite raised concerns of a new arms race in space among would powers yesterday

AP

TOKYO-China's anti-satellite weapons test raised concerns in Asia and the US yesterday about the rising militarization of space and prompted governments to demand explanations from Beijing. The US said China conducted the test earlier this month in which an old Chinese weather satellite was destroyed by a missile. Analysts said China's weather satellites would travel at about the same altitude as US spy satellites, so the test represented an indirect threat to US defense systems. Officials in Japan and Australia immediately demanded China explain its actions. Australian Foreign Minister Alexander Downer, who was in New York, said Sydney opposed the test and had called upon Beijing's ambassador to Australia, Madame Fu Ying, for an explanation."Our concern about this is that to have a capacity to shoot down satellites in outer space is not consistent with ... the traditional Chinese position of opposition to the militarization of outer space," he told reporters. "So we've asked the Chinese for an explanation as to what this may mean," Downer said, adding that so far Chinese officials, including the ambassador in Canberra, said they are not aware of the incident. The US Department of Defense would not comment on the test, but other US officials said it raised serious concerns in Washington. "The US believes China's development and testing of such weapons is inconsistent with the spirit of cooperation that both countries aspire to in the civil space area," National Security Council spokesman Gordon Johndroe said Thursday. "We and other countries have expressed our concern to the Chinese." Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe said Tokyo has asked Beijing for an explanation and stressed the importance of the peaceful use of space. "We must use space peacefully," he said. "We are asking the Chinese government about the test." Taipei Times (1/20)

TV show ‘24’ under fire from Muslim group

LOS ANGELES: Hit US television show ‘24’ came under fire from a Muslim group on Thursday, which accused the programme’s makers of fuelling anti-Muslim prejudice with its latest storyline. The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) said ‘24’s’ season premiere, in which Islamic terrorists detonated a nuclear bomb near Los Angeles, risked stoking racial hatred. The criticism was swiftly rejected by the show’s network Fox Broadcasting, which said the series did not single out ethnic groups to be villains. The raw emotional impact of fictional scenes that include widespread death and destruction in America may adversely affect the public’s attitude toward civil liberties, religious freedom and interfaith relations,’ the CAIR statement said. ‘The programme’s repeated association of acts of terrorism with Islam will only serve to increase anti-Muslim prejudice in our society,’ it added. Representatives of the award-winning series responded by pointing out that during the show’s five seasons villains have included Americans, Baltic Europeans, Germans, Russians, Islamic fundamentalists and the fictional president of the United States. ‘The producers are sensitive to the fact that over the course of the series no ethnic group be singled out for persecution or blame,’ a statement from Fox said. ‘In fact, the show has made a concerted effort to show ethnic, religious and political groups as multi-dimensional, and political issues are debated from multiple viewpoints.’ CAIR has raised similar concerns about ‘24’ storylines in the past. In response to the complaint two years ago, Fox aired a public service announcement featuring ‘24’s’ star Kiefer Sutherland, urging viewers to avoid stereotyping Muslims. International News (Pakistan) (1/20)

DEVELOPMENT: Business 'Ignores' Human Rights

Moyiga Nduru

JOHANNESBURG, Jan 17 (IPS) - From Iraq to Nigeria, multinational corporations are ignoring human rights, entrenching a culture of abuse and impunity that is difficult to eradicate, a leading anti-apartheid activist warns. Kader Asmal, a former South African minister of education, says the abuses run from environmental degradation around the world to the more than 90,000 security contractors, engaged in murky multi-billion-dollar businesses, in war-torn Iraq. "The contracts awarded lack accountability and transparency under international laws. Many of the companies, run by powerful countries, are liable for war crimes," said Asmal, a lawyer and a member of South Africa's parliament. No official record exists of the number of security firms in Iraq, some of which are believed to have been set up illegally. But the Washington Post, quoting the military's first census of the growing population of civilians operating in the battlefield, said on Dec. 6, 2006, that about 100,000 U.S. government contractors operate in Iraq. They are involved in a range of military-related activities, including supplying army equipment, building military barracks and providing private security to senior Iraqi officials. Like Asmal, the more than 150 participants who took part in a conference organised by the Pretoria-based Foundation for Human Rights on "business, accountability and human rights" in Johannesburg, Jan.16-17, generally agreed that the campaign to inculcate a culture of human rights in business is moving slowly. There is either a lack of interest, or reluctance, amongst entrepreneurs, said conference participants. Inter Press News Service Agency (Africa) (1/20)

Genoa riot evidence 'disappears'

By Adam Blenford , BBC News

Key evidence in the trial of 29 Italian police officers charged over violence during the 2001 G8 summit in Genoa has vanished, police say. Two Molotov cocktails allegedly planted by police in a school used as a base by anti-globalisation protesters can no longer be found. The bombs are seen as crucial physical evidence against many of the defendants in the high-profile trial. The police are accused of brutality and perjury over a raid on the Diaz school. The petrol bombs - expected to be a key piece of evidence in the case - were due to be presented in court this week. Prosecutors now fear that the case could collapse, allowing many of the high-ranking defendants to walk free. The apparent disappearance of important evidence sparked strong reactions within Italy. The presiding judge called for an immediate explanation. The Reform Communist party - part of Prime Minister Romano Prodi's centre-left coalition government - has asked for a parliamentary investigation. Mark Covell, a British journalist who suffered serious injuries in the Diaz raid, told the BBC News website the disappearance could endanger the whole trial. "They have spent 20 million euros (£13m) on this and if these Molotov cocktails aren't found it could all be for nothing," he said. "I'm a bit shocked and numb at the state of the Italian judiciary. "But we can't calculate the full impact of this yet. We will have to wait and see." BBC (1/20)Four more killed in Guinea as crisis talks under wayCONAKRY (AFP) - Four people were killed when security forces dispersed thousands of demonstrators in Guinea on the 11th day of a paralyzing general strike, as union leaders began talks with the government on a way out of the crisis. The deaths brought to nine the number killed in clashes in the west African country since trade unions launched the strike on January 10 against President Lansana Conte's rule and corruption charges. The unions' meeting with senior officials wrapped up Saturday with no concrete results, but the two sides will resume talks at 1200 GMT Sunday. "The meeting was unproductive, the only advance is that the unions and the government will meet again tomorrow," said labor union representative Ousmane Souare. "We are strongly for the rule of law. That's why we have not called for the army to intervene but rather the National Assembly and the Supreme Court," he added. Concerned over the deteriorating situation, the 15-nation Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) agreed to send to Guinea as mediators the presidents of Senegal and Nigeria, Abdoulaye Wade and Olusegun Obasanjo. The four protesters died of bullet wounds, a hospital official told AFP by telephone from Nzerekore, Guinea's second-largest city, which Saturday held its first demonstration since the strike started 11 days ago. Agence France Presse (1/20)

European Court Finds Two Chechens Were Tortured

Ruling Is Panel's First On Issue in Restive Russian Republic

By Peter Finn, Washington Post Foreign Service

MOSCOW, Jan. 18 -- The European Court of Human Rights ruled Thursday that two Chechen brothers were tortured in their strife-torn Russian republic and that authorities there failed to investigate their allegations of abuse. It was the first decision on torture in Chechnya issued by the court, based in Strasbourg, France. "The applicants were indisputably kept in a permanent state of physical pain and anxiety owing to their uncertainty about their fate and to the level of violence to which they were subjected throughout the period of their detention," according to a panel of seven judges, who reached a unanimous decision. "The Court considers that such treatment was intentionally inflicted on the applicants by agents of the State acting in the course of their duties," the judgment stated, "with the aim of extracting from them a confession or information about the offences of which they were suspected." Human rights groups have long contended that torture is widespread in Chechnya, where Russian troops have fought separatists off and on since 1994. Thursday's ruling follows a series of judgments against Russia concerning disappearances and the indiscriminate use of force by the Russian military and its proxies in the southern republic. Washington Post (1/20)

Zeus worshippers demand access to temple

DEREK GATOPOULOS, Associated Press Writer

ATHENS, Greece - After all these centuries, Zeus may have a few thunderbolts left. A tiny group of worshippers plans a rare ceremony Sunday to honor the ancient Greek gods, at Athens' 1,800-year-old Temple of Olympian Zeus. Greece's Culture Ministry has declared the central Athens site off-limits, but worshippers say they will defy the decision. "These are our temples and they should be used by followers of our religion," said Doreta Peppa, head of the Athens-based Ellinais, a group campaigning to revive the ancient religion. "Of course we will go ahead with the event ... we will enter the site legally," said Peppa, who calls herself a high priestess of the revived faith. "We will issue a call for peace, who can be opposed to that?" Peppa said the ceremony will be held in honor of Zeus, king of the ancient gods, but did not give other details. The daily Ethnos newspaper, citing the group's application to the Culture Ministry to use the site, said the 90-minute event would include hymns, dancers, torchbearers, and worshippers in ancient costumes. Greece's archaic religion is believed to have several hundred official followers, mainly middle-aged and elderly academics, lawyers and other professionals. They typically share a keen interest in ancient history and a dislike for the Greek Orthodox Church.Ancient rituals are re-enacted every two years at Olympia, in southern Greece, where the flame lighting ceremony is held for the summer and winter Olympic games. But the event is not regarded as a religious ceremony and actresses are used to pose as high priestesses. Yahoo News/ Associated Press (1/20)